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US court finally closes 'rogue' ISP

Internet service provider Pricewert LLC, whose mission was to spread spam, malware and child pornography, has finally been taken off the internet. It was disconnected by its upstream providers and had its assets frozen, almost a year after the US regulator, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), obtained a preliminary injunction against the company. A statement from the Federal District Court in San Jose, said that the ISP's systems and servers had been seized and are to be sold off. The proceeds of the sale would go to the US authorities, who are entitled to $1080,000 from the judgement.

Pricewert, who also acted under the names 3FN and APS Telecom, actively recruited criminals and offered them a platform for communication. The company regularly ignored requests to remove illegal content or moved pages to other addresses to prevent further prosecution. The company's servers also hosted C&C servers used to control botnets. More than 4,500 programs used to spy on users checked in with control servers on 3FN's network. According to the original report, NASA's Computer Crime Division, forensic scientists at the University of Alabama, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, the Shadowserver Foundation, which specialises in monitoring botnets, Symantec and Spamhaus all assisted in gathering evidence for the case.